Per his daughter Chloe on Instagram, Bob Weir, guitarist, vocalist, and co-founder of the Grateful Dead, has passed away at age 78. “It is with profound sadness that we share the passing of Bobby Weir,” she wrote. “He transitioned peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after courageously beating cancer as only Bobby could. Unfortunately, he succumbed to underlying lung issues.” Chloe said that her father’s “final months reflected the same spirit that defined his life. Diagnosed in July, he began treatment only weeks before returning to his hometown stage for a three-night celebration of 60 years of music at Golden Gate Park. Those performances, emotional, soulful, and full of light, were not farewells, but gifts. Another act of resilience.”
Born on the Bay in October 1947, Weir began playing guitar at age 13 after failing to figure out the piano and trumpet. His dyslexia got him kicked out of every school he attended, until he wound up at Fountain Valley in Colorado, where he’d meet future Grateful Dead lyricist John Perry Barlow. When Weir was 16, he and a buddy caught a whiff of banjo music in a Palo Alto back alley on New Year’s Eve. They followed the trail all the way to Dana Morgan’s Music Store, where a 21-year-old music teacher named Jerry Garcia was picking. He and Weir spent the night jamming together and struck up a group together, which Weir likened to the Beatles if they were a jug band. “What we saw them doing was impossibly attractive,” he said. “I couldn’t think of anything else more worth doing.” They called themselves Mother McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions and then, later, the Warlocks. Eventually they sorted the name out: the Grateful Dead.
Weir played rhythm guitar and sang lead on many Dead tunes. He ran point on a few of my favorites, like “Playing in the Band,” “Estimated Prophet,” and “Sugar Magnolia,” one of the best songs in the English language. Weir’s guitar playing wasn’t strong at first, but by the time drummer Mickey Hart left the band temporarily in 1971, he was one of the best around. His voicings were clearer than ever. “I found myself astonished, delighted, and excited beyond measure at what Bobby was doing,” bassist Phil Lesh, who later called Weir’s style “quirky, whimsical, and goofy,” commented. He would tinker with slide guitar in the ‘70s, picking up ideas from hard bop pianist McCoy Tyner and gospel players like Rev. Gary Davis. Weir was also a catalyst in a couple other bands, including Kingfish, RatDog, Scraping the Children, Further, Bobby and the Midnites, the Bob Weir Band, and, most notably (alongside Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann, and John Mayer), Dead & Company. Weir made his solo record, Ace, in 1972, and his last solo record, Blue Mountain, in 2016.
Weir’s passing marks the third Dead member to die since 2024, joining the late Phil Lesh and Donna Jean Godchaux-MacKay across the bridge. May the four winds blow you safely home, Bob. Hang it up and see what tomorrow brings. Read Chloe’s full statement below.
Listen to Bob Weir sing some Grateful Dead tunes below.
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